A tragedy of negligence

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Of course, the sad truth about the death of University of Notre Dame football team’s cameraman is that it didn’t have to happen.

Therefore, I can say with full confidence that the death of Declan Sullivan was not only preventable, but should have been prevented, and that Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick and coach Brian Kelly should pay for the tragedy with their jobs.Every professional cameraman has horror stories about shooting from scissor lifts. My guys this week all nodded grimly and knowingly when the news broke. No one was surprised. Many of them refuse to go up on a scissor lift in anything but perfect, windless conditions, such as those we had Saturday in Florida. And these arent fraidy cats — they have shot out the door of helicopters during boat races and jumped the wall in NASCAR pits and gotten in the way of angry bulls on rodeo shoots. Yet the idea that Sullivan would mount the scissor lift in conditions far from ideal shocked them.

via FOOTBALL OUTSIDERS: Innovative Statistics, Intelligent Analysis | One Foot Inbounds: Tragedy Off The Field.

Notre Dame has been playing like a second rate football team and this young man’s death speaks to the fact that this AD and Head coach are running a second rate program.